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I found out my new college e-mail address in 2005 from a letter in the mail. Right after opening the envelope, I went straight to the computer. I was part of a LiveJournal group made of incoming students, and we had all been eagerly awaiting our college e-mail addresses, which had a use above and beyond corresponding with professors or student housing: back then, they were required tokens for entry to the fabled thefacebook.com.

That was nine years ago, and Facebook has now been in existence for 10. But even in those early days, Facebook's cultural impact can't be overstated. A search for "Facebook" on Google Scholar alone now produces 1.2 million results from 2006 on; "Physics" only returns 456,000.

But in terms of presence, Facebook is flopping around a bit now. The ever-important "teens" despise it, and it's not the runaway success, happy addiction, or awe-inspiring source of information it once was. We've curated our identities so hard and had enough experiences with unforeseen online conflict that Facebook can now feel more isolating than absorbing. But what we are dissatisfied with is what Facebook has been, not what it is becoming.

Even if the grand sociological experiment that was Facebook is now running a little dry, the company knows this—which is why it's transforming Facebook into a completely different entity. And the cause of all this built-up disarray that's pushing change? It's us. To prove it, let's consider the social constructs and weirdnesses Facebook gave rise to, how they ultimately undermined the site, and how these ideas are shaping Facebook into the company it is now and will become.

Cue that Randy Newman song

Facebook arrived late to the concept of online friending, long after researchers started wondering about the structure of these social networks. What Facebook did for friending, especially reciprocal friending, was write it so large that it became a common concern. How many friends you had, who did and did not friend you back, and who should friend each other first all became things that normal people worried about.

Once Facebook opened beyond colleges, it became such a one-to-one representation of an actual social network that scientists started to study it. They applied social theories like those of weak ties or identity creation to see how they played out sans, or in supplement to, face-to-face interactions.

In a 2007 study, when Facebook was still largely campus-bound, a group of researchers said that Facebook "appears to play an important role in the process by which students form and maintain social capital." They were using it to keep in touch with old friends and "to maintain or intensify relationships characterized by some form of offline connection."

This sounds mundane now, since Facebook is so integrated into much of our lives. Seeing former roommates or childhood friends posting updates to Facebook feels as commonplace as literally seeing them nearly every day back when we were still roommates at 20 or friends at eight.

But the ability to keep tabs on someone without having to be proactive about it—no writing an e-mail, making a phone call, etc.—became the unique selling factor of Facebook. Per the 2007 study above, Facebook became a rich opportunity for "convert[ing] latent ties into weak ties," connections that are valuable because they are with people who are sufficiently distant socially to bring in new information and opportunities.

Some romantic pixels have been spilled about the way no one is ever lost to anyone anymore; most people, including ex-lovers, estranged family members, or missed connections are only a Wi-Fi signal away.

"Modern technology has made our worlds smaller, but perhaps it also has diminished life's mysteries, and with them, some sense of romance," writes David Vecsey in TheNew York Times. Vecsey cites a time when he tracked down a former lover "across two countries and an ocean," something he would not have done in the absence of passive social media monitoring. "It was only in her total absence, in a total vacuum away from her, that I was able to appreciate the depth of love I felt."

The art of the Facebook-stalk

While plenty of studies have been conducted on the productive uses of Facebook—forming or maintaining weak ties, supplementing close relationships, or fostering new, casual ones—there are plenty that also touch on the site as a means for passive monitoring. Whether it was someone we'd never met, a new acquaintance, or an unrequited infatuation, Facebook eventually had enough breadth that you could call up virtually anyone's profile, if only to see how fat they've gotten.

One study referred to this process as "social investigation." We developed particular behaviors to avoid creating suspicion: do not "like" anything by the object of a stalking session, or if we do like it, don't "like" too quickly; be careful not to type a name we want to search into the status field by accident; set an object of monitoring as a "close friend," even if they aren't, so their updates show up without fail; friend their friends; surreptitiously visit profile pages multiple times a day in case we missed anything.

This passive monitoring is one of the more utilitarian uses of Facebook. It's also one of the most addictive. The (fictionalized) movie The Social Network closes with Facebook's founder, Mark Zuckerberg, gazing at the Facebook profile of a high-school crush. Facebook did away with the necessity of keeping tabs on anyone. You simply had all of the tabs, all of the time, with the most recent information whenever you wanted to look at them.

The book Digital Discourse cites a classic example of the Facebook stalk in an IM conversation between two teenagers:

"I just saw what Tanya Eisner wrote on your Facebook wall. Go to her house," one says.
"Woah, didn't even see that til right now," replies the other.
"Haha it looks like I stalk you… which I do," says the first.
"I stalk u too its ok," comforts the second.

But even innocent, casual information recon in the form of a Facebook stalk can rub us the wrong way. Any instance of a Facebook interaction that ends with an unexpected third body's involvement can taint the rest of users' Facebook behavior, making us feel watched.

Digital Discourse states that "when people feel themselves to be the objects of stalking, creeping, or lurking by third parties, they express annoyance or even moral outrage." It cites an example of another teenager who gets a wall post from a person she barely knows, and it explains something she wrote about in a status update. "Don't stalk my status," she writes in mocking command to another friend, as if talking to the interloper.

You are who you choose to be

"The advent of the Internet has changed the traditional conditions of identity production," reads a study from 2008 on how people presented themselves on Facebook. People had been curating their presences online for a long time before Facebook, but the fact that Facebook required real names and, for a long time after its inception, association with an educational institution made researchers wonder if it would make people hew a little closer to reality.

But beyond the bounds of being tied to a real name, users still projected an idealized self to others; a type of "possible self," or many possible selves, depending on their sharing settings. Rather than try to describe themselves to others, users projected a sort of aspirational identity.

People were more likely to associate themselves with cultural touchstones, like movies, books, or music, than really identify themselves. You might not say you like rock music, but you might write Led Zeppelin as one of your favorite bands, and everyone else can infer your taste in music as well as general taste and coolness from there.

These identity proxies also became vectors for seeking approval. "The appeal is as much to the likeability of my crowd, the desirability of my boyfriend, or the magic of my music as it is to the personal qualities of the Facebook users themselves," said the study. The authors also noted that, for instance, users tended to post photos of themselves mostly in groups in social situations. Even the profile photos, which would ostensibly have a single subject, were socially styled.

As the study concluded, "identity is not an individual characteristic; it is not an expression of something innate in a person, it is rather a social product, the outcome of a given social environment and hence performed differently in varying contexts." Because Facebook was so susceptible to this "performance," so easily controlled and curated, it quickly became less about real people and more about highlight reels.

We came to Facebook to see other real people, but everyone, even casual users, saw it could be gamed for personal benefit. Inflicting our groomed identities on each other soon became its own problem.

Fear of missing out

A long-time problem of social networks has been that the bad feelings they can generate are greatly disproportional to good ones.

In strict terms of self-motivation, posting something and getting a good reception feels good. But most of Facebook use is watching other people post about their own accomplishments and good times. For a social network of 300 friends with an even distribution of auspicious life events, you are seeing 300 times as many good things happen to others as happen to you (of course, everyone has the same amount of good luck, but in bulk for the consumer, it doesn't feel that way). If you were happy before looking at Facebook, or even after posting your own good news, you're not now.

The feelings of inadequacy did start to drive people back to Facebook. Even in the middle of our own vacations, celebration dinners, or weddings, we might check Facebook during or after to compare notes and see if we really had the best time possible.

That feeling became known as FOMO, "fear of missing out." As Jenna Wortham wrote in TheNew York Times, "When we scroll through pictures and status updates, the worry that tugs at the corners of our minds is set off by the fear of regret… we become afraid that we've made the wrong decision about how to spend our time."

Even if you had your own great stuff to tell Facebook about, someone out there is always doing better. And Facebook won't let you forget. The brewing feeling of inferiority means users don't post about stuff that might be too lame. They might start to self-censor, and then the bar for what is worth the "risk" of posting rises higher and higher. As people stop posting, there is less to see, less reason to come back and interact, like, or comment on other people's material. Ultimately, people, in turn, have less reason to post.

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Casey Johnston
Casey Johnston is the former Culture Editor at Ars Technica, and now does the occasional freelance story. She graduated from Columbia University with a degree in Applied Physics. Twitter@caseyjohnston

I haven't posted to my page in over a year. Logged in maybe 4 times in that same time. For me, it wasn't the "fear of missing out" on what's happening on Facebook. It was a "fear of missing out" on the real world that's happening right in front of me.

When I'm on my death-bed, I don't want to be saying "Gee, I wish I had 'like'd a few more cat pictures in my day."

tl;dr: Facebook depresses me, as all I was able to use it for is comparing my self worth to other people.

I killed my Facebook account like a reformed person killed a drug addiction. I've built PCs, and posted my other projects on there, and nobody gave a damn. People go to parties, get drunk, or post a bunch of homophobic comments, and they get a bunch of "Likes". There are other friends of mine that are off to better things, and I kinda get envious and depressed because I feel like I'm behind everyone else in life dispite doing all the right things, getting good grades, and keeping my nose clean.

End rant.

The internet has done a tremendous job of connecting me to other people, cultures, and viewpoints around the world. However, I wouldn't rely it to communicate with your best friend, or next door neighbor.

Bah humbug. Yes messaging apps are popular. But that seems to be the only verifiable number in the article. When you make sweeping statements a couple of statistics to back them up would be nice.

In other words are there any numbers that show that people stop posting status messages / pictures etc.? From my personal unscientific experience I would say this is completely untrue. People have always chattet a lot with sms and message tools. Not saying the article is wrong and perhaps I just didn't read all source links but a couple charts and statistics in the article might make it stronger for me. As it is I do not trust the conclusions.

Just looked over it and unless I am mistaken there doesn't seem to be much to back up its sweeping conclusions just some general links that point to people feeling the same way. Now that is thin like a biscuit.

I want to see a statistic about status posts and uploaded pictures per user and per existing(I. E. Following a set of users for longer) user over time. If this is going down there might be some substance to all of the conjecture. As it is its just a general feeling the author and some random people in the Internet seem to have. I think it's just in vogue to think Facebook is in trouble. It's such a good story but the share price doesn't support this.

And I do not like Facebook but I think it's narcissistic main function of projecting a facade of your life to the outside world is as relevant as ever.

I haven't posted to my page in over a year. Logged in maybe 4 times in that same time. For me, it wasn't the "fear of missing out" on what's happening on Facebook. It was a "fear of missing out" on the real world that's happening right in front of me.

When I'm on my death-bed, I don't want to be saying "Gee, I wish I had 'like'd a few more cat pictures in my day."

I respect people who feel that way...but not everyone who uses Facebook just uses it for cat memes.

In 2006, I moved to a small city with my wife and a one-month-old baby. We didn't know anyone who lived here (besides the few people I worked with). If you think about it, that's an intensely isolating experience, because the opportunities for building new friendships are limited both by the number of people where we were living and the complete lack of an ability to "go out on the town" and meet a lot of new people. Both of us had well-established social networks that were now hundreds or thousands of miles away.

Thirty years ago, we would have exchanged Christmas cards with our old friends, and quickly faded away from their memory (and vice versa). For me, though, first through MySpace and then through Facebook, I actually was able to keep in touch. Not the monumental "are you married, where are you living, where do you work" conversations that can be summarized in a Christmas card, but the little day-to-day banter that makes someone much more than their curriculum vitae. Ripping each other's sports teams. Seeing some new routine that a college friend who is now a dance instructor on the opposite coast has choreographed. Complimenting a friend on her new haircut. Cooing over a new puppy that a couple of high school friends got. Talking about the latest metal band with a friend who now lives in Germany.

This isn't a matter of wanting to hide from the world. We still made new friends where we live. But we didn't let our old friendships wither, and some of them are still some of the best friendships we've ever had. Facebook, for all its annoying user-interface issues and annoying privacy-setting issues, facilitated that. You generally have to have something important to talk about to call someone up. You don't have to have anything important to talk about to banter on Facebook. And that regular, insignificant banter is more important to a friendship than it seems at first glance.

It'll be interesting to see what they do to avoid the fate of MySpace.

Myself, i've always treated it with derision and contempt - does that make me 'ahead of the curve' now? But then, i've never had a practical need for it. So that's probably the difference.

Mostly I'll be glad when I no longer see it in a game I want to play (or general app for that matter) as some stupid sidebar or giant login button that the devs thought would make their game 'hip to the kids' instead of focusing on what they were meant to be doing - making the damn game! I've even come across the occasional website that only uses Facebook logins and no other method. Seriously, it's like cutting off your nose to spite your face./rant

I told my father-in-law about it, thinking it might be useful for keeping in touch. His first question was "How much does an account cost?" and I explained it was all free.

He thought about it for a couple of moments and then said "If you don't pay them you can't be a customer, can you? Who is paying them?" which led to a discussion about the Facebook business model. After some minutes his conclusion was that we are merely the product.

It was the first time that I had heard that suggestion, although I've seen the same conclusion espoused by many people since then. I guess I have a wise father-in-law, even if he's a retired fireman with no special knowledge of business or computers.

I utterly refuse to use the Facebook messaging functionality for exactly that reason, plus: use and dissemination of brand mentions without a means of opting out and no telling what facebook's future use of retained messaging data will be. Other proprietary or app-based messaging either does have or will eventually have similar data use concerns. And even on one service, like facebook, users are never given the choice of either upgrading functionality or keeping the same terms of service and privacy policy.

From what I read, basically, it's going to be something like AOL Instant Messenger where you have friends you actually talk with. How they'd monetize that is anyone's guess.

But based on other articles, Facebook is following the same pattern as an epidemic (as in disease). Once it's reached enough people, and they find out how fundamentally boring all the crap that's posted by people they've "friended" but don't really know happens to be, they lose interest. Facebook will collapse, probably within the next two years. It will still have hundreds of millions of "users", but its monthly visitation rate will tank. It's not picking up the younger audience it needs to stay going and the older ones aren't bothering with it, realizing after the 'gee whiz' factor fades that there's something else better they do need to deal with: a life.

It'll be interesting to see what they do to avoid the fate of MySpace.

Myself, i've always treated it with derision and contempt - does that make me 'ahead of the curve' now? But then, i've never had a practical need for it. So that's probably the difference.

Mostly I'll be glad when I no longer see it in a game I want to play (or general app for that matter) as some stupid sidebar or giant login button that the devs thought would make their game 'hip to the kids' instead of focusing on what they were meant to be doing - making the damn game! I've even come across the occasional website that only uses Facebook logins and no other method. Seriously, it's like cutting off your nose to spite your face./rant

I got over the constant changes.. what began as a service that only shared amongst people you wanted to became a service that you had to often check wasn't being broadcast to a wider audience that's not intended.

For every 'friend' i've found on facebook there's at least one that i wish i hadn't (or found me).

Facebook is just a tool, just because everyone follows the herd mentality and uses it in only one particular way doesn't mean that it's the only use for it.

Facebook is a popularity contest for most people. But is that how you wish to use it? You can just as easily have a few dozen connections and curate your news feed to show you updates from only people you care about.

More than that, the primary use of Facebook should be content delivery, not from people, but from publishers! You can simply 'like' pages from publishers of interest to you, and you'll have their latest content sitting in your news feed instantly. It's like a newspaper with your favourite content - NGC, Foreign Policy, WSJ, New Yorker, local newspapers, financial news, history - anything that floats your boat probably has a Facebook page and posts links to their online content. In fact, most of your news feed should not consist of news from people, but from publishers.

At the end of the day, the utility of Facebook depends on how you use it. If you haven't discovered a use for it, then I am afraid you may be missing out on a tool to access information important to you in a rather organized and timely manner. Doesn't have to be about people. Of course, there are other ways to access this information too, through RSS feeds or news aggregation applications, but this is one way to do it while keeping connected with people important to you.

I lost interest about 4 years ago when I decided to delete my account. I stay in touch with friends through Skype, text, emails, and the old fashioned face to face. I've found a few healthy relationships are worth more than a thousand Facebook "friends."

It'll be interesting to see what they do to avoid the fate of MySpace.

Myself, i've always treated it with derision and contempt - does that make me 'ahead of the curve' now? But then, i've never had a practical need for it. So that's probably the difference.

Mostly I'll be glad when I no longer see it in a game I want to play (or general app for that matter) as some stupid sidebar or giant login button that the devs thought would make their game 'hip to the kids' instead of focusing on what they were meant to be doing - making the damn game! I've even come across the occasional website that only uses Facebook logins and no other method. Seriously, it's like cutting off your nose to spite your face./rant

First there was SMS (an unexpected resounding and very lucrative success), then Whatsapp, Snapchat, Facebook.

People, in tech, are always looking for the "next big thing", investors as well. That's what drives innovation and change.

So, Facebook has become boring also because (not mentioned in this wonderful and interesting article, so maybe it could be for the next installment?) it has become the place where, for a teen or a young adult, your parents, family, grandma, boss, etc are.

This is no longer a network of peers. Vertical relationships in real life have been transported to Facebook. So young people switch to where this "parental control (oversight)" is not there. Such as Whatsapp, Snapchat or else.

It is just the same as in music.

Teens adore a certain music group (Backstreet Boys, New Kids on the Block, Spice Girls up to One Direction). It's a "peer thing" it identifies them as part of a group. Parents are not allowed and, if they are, it's just because they have the money to spend on merchandising and have a driving license (I am purposefully caricaturing things).Then these young adults grow up with their band. The band changes music, they change with it.Leaving the next batch of young adults free to follow "the next big thing". And the cycle goes on and on. It has been like that since the Beatles and Elvis, and maybe even earlier. People in their 30s might still listen to Backstreet Boys because it brings them back in time.

For sports it is a bit different. Since a sports team in itself doesn't "age", and it constantly has ups and downs, it might be a "generation transmissible disease" to be fan of a certain group.

What does it have to do with Facebook?

Facebook has bought Instagram, because they knew or thought it would be the next big thing.Apple has lived with the Mac, then the majority of revenues came from the iPod and now come from the iPhone.

So Facebook, in order to survive, must reinvent itself, possibly even under a different name, so that it can be seen as "the next big thing".Google understood that well. It started with web search and the related revenues, then followed a series of "Google branded" products (Gmaps, Gmail, Gearth). But then came Android. Purposefully not under the "G" naming. Then came Motorola, but it was an "old" and established brand (the opposite of Android for the general public when they bought it).Now they just bought Nest. I wouldn't be surprised if the name stays on, because it would be a wise move, in my opinion.

So Facebook needs to expand and reinvent. I agree with the article when it says that basically the next Facebook will not be Facebook. But that's the cycle of invention and innovation. And maybe, just maybe, one day it will come back as a "vintage" thing, and people might love it.

Biggest issue with Facebook these days (ignoring the Privacy concerns) is their "curation" of content.

A large proportion of people I am friends with on Facebook I see very rarely, if at all, now that we have kids and have spread to the four winds. If it were working as it should, Facebook should act like the Christmas Letter, but on a more regular basis. Little snippets of what people are up to.

It's so frustrating when I click on a persons wall to find dozens of posts that have never made it to my feed, because Facebook have "decided" that our relationship isn't strong enough to merit attention.

I want to to see what my Friends are up to - and will respond to those if needed. If they share too much I want to be able to turn down the volume.

And that doesn't even begin to touch on the Firms / Bands / Fan Pages that are affected by the same issues.

Biggest issue with Facebook these days (ignoring the Privacy concerns) is their "curation" of content.

A large proportion of people I am friends with on Facebook I see very rarely, if at all, now that we have kids and have spread to the four winds. If it were working as it should, Facebook should act like the Christmas Letter, but on a more regular basis. Little snippets of what people are up to.

It's so frustrating when I click on a persons wall to find dozens of posts that have never made it to my feed, because Facebook have "decided" that our relationship isn't strong enough to merit attention.

I want to to see what my Friends are up to - and will respond to those if needed. If they share too much I want to be able to turn down the volume.

And that doesn't even begin to touch on the Firms / Bands / Fan Pages that are affected by the same issues.

Maybe you need to curate your news feed better - tell Facebook what you don't want to see, and stuff you want to see will automatically become more prominent.

It looks like my experience isn't really representative, but: I've found Facebook to be a really useful spur to action. Seeing other people going out and doing things - travelling, indulging in hobbies, working out - can certainly generate a reaction of 'those people have a better life than me', or, perhaps more realistically, 'those people spend more time cultivating their online image than me'.

But it can also provide an incentive to get out there and do stuff. In the last few years I've taken my hobbies more seriously, particularly photography; my Facebook friends seem happy enough to be a ready-made audience for feedback on my amateur efforts, positive and negative. I've had more incentive to get running, I've found cool stuff to do in my home city that wouldn't have occurred to me, and I've been able to opportunistically meet up with old friends passing through my part of town, including some who normally live on the other side of the planet.

My usage pattern may not be great for Facebook, as I'm aging out of the preferred demographic and I don't engage with as many brands as they'd probably like. But I'm pretty certain Facebook's been a net good for my social life. Variance in your mileage should be expected.

Not a big FB user, but I found this article so full of over generalisations and assertions without support that I was getting peeved before the end of the first page.

Quote:

If you were happy before looking at Facebook, or even after posting your own good news, you're not now.

Shit. Really? I didn't know I was so miserable.

Quote:

Facebook as a platform has become too intimidating for most people.

And yet further up the article you stated that FB is doing incredibly well; its user stats are high. Moreover, later in the article you link to a Mashable page that points out FB consumes more time than Google or any other internet service.

Quote:

Facebook isn't about connecting with each other anymore. The faces of Facebook are now its most boring aspect;

Says who?

Quote:

Most users now think of Facebook—the place to keep up on the activities of people—as a chore

Another unempirical assertion. The link provided for this doesn't say anything about people's feelings on using Fb.

Then there's the whole 'this is my PhD and I want to make a popular article out of it' style of the piece.

At the end of the article, I still didn't get 'the promise'. What is it that FB is turning into that's our fault?

As someone who never understood why people were attracted to Facebook in the first place (I am supposed to like reading about the mundane crap people get up to in their daily lives? Write about mine as well? Appreciate how my personal info is being used to generate revenue and target me better with ads?), I guess this makes me ahead of the curve in this respect.Hopefully Facebok will join Myspace in history's dustbin before long.

As for people transitioning to messaging apps like WhatsApp: why? Plain old email does the same and more, is a standard, is interoperable across providers and it's not like getting an email address is much of a hurdle.

tl;dr: Facebook depresses me, as all I was able to use it for is comparing my self worth to other people.

I killed my Facebook account like a reformed person killed a drug addiction. I've built PCs, and posted my other projects on there, and nobody gave a damn. People go to parties, get drunk, or post a bunch of homophobic comments, and they get a bunch of "Likes". There are other friends of mine that are off to better things, and I kinda get envious and depressed because I feel like I'm behind everyone else in life dispite doing all the right things, getting good grades, and keeping my nose clean.

Related : a lot of what people share is hidden for some reason. Facebook reorders and promotes certain stories in a completely opaque way. I will discover days or weeks after the fact that a friend had shared something that I otherwise would have enjoyed knowing about, only to have Facebook hide it from me for much of that time. No idea way. And it feels like pure chance that I see that story at all.

And it sucks because I'm sure that person is wondering why nobody Like-ed their stuff.

tl;dr: Facebook depresses me, as all I was able to use it for is comparing my self worth to other people.

There is a very thin line between keeping your friends/family in the loop and (trying) to show off.

FB is a convenient way to get the adoration and envy from one's peer group without the douchebag-label that would come with showing off like this in real life.

At least that's what they hope. I still think "What a douche" when someone is posting "awesome vacation pics" every day.

That's just it. The people I keep in the loop are within my own community, and rarely communicate outside Facebook. I've learned that these "Facebook" friends aren't really friends (figuratively speaking), because they don't resolve this epic loneliness, nor are they as supportive. I'll play an online game for our amusement, or fix a PC with TeamViewer. However, Facebook just can't resolve the need for human contact and support.

I usually just use Reddit, 4chan (don't laugh), or some BBS of yore to communicate with others on the internet, about a ton of topics. Even on Ars, I don't have to worry about my 'issues' (open to interpretation), because the only thing people have to judge me and others on is my words. The internet may not do a good job with keeping in contact with my neighbor, but I find that its excellent that it helps me communicate with other people around the world.

Facebook opted for getting everyone to friend like youd never had a friend before. Dozens of them, hundreds of them, friend, friend, friend.

Understandable to build the network and get better advertising revenue but its unfortunately also breaking it.

If you are not already aware, facebook has algorithms slicing away a sizeable chunk of all the content from your friends, because there is too damn much of it. With people having hundreds of 'friends' many visiting and posting multiple messages a day displaying it all is an intractable problem but a problem of facebooks design.

They now sell a higher ranking in their system to companies, and even you if you want to pay... but the result of that is that companies with money are becoming more effective at disseminating information than you are to your own circle of friends. More people are seeing Amazon than your posts informing people about the situation in Syria for example, because one can pay to spread the information and the other isnt going to garner many likes despite its significance.

If thats not a broken social system I dont know what is. Veritasium of youtube fame has also commented on this system showing some stats on how everything regardless of importance or popularity inevitably gets drowned out. [Edit: Though I should note he is not an unbiassed source while trying to spread his own channel of course.]

I dont know what this means for the future, many people dont have much of a problem with the algorithms or arent really aware of them in the first place. (Which is a bit sad if you think about it.) It also has plenty of other uses for personal events and such, clearly millions of us still need it myself included.

but while I think facebook will remain strong for some time yet even the biggest Internet companies fall and I think this algorithm pay to show system is the chink in the armour. Facebook needs to tread carefully because if they do fail I would bet it will be because people grow sick of it.

They now sell a higher ranking in their system to companies, and even you if you want to pay... but the result of that is that companies with money are becoming more effective at disseminating information than you are to your own circle of friends. More people are seeing Amazon than your posts informing people about the situation in Syria for example, because one can pay to spread the information and the other isnt going to garner many likes despite its significance.

If thats not a broken social system I dont know what is.

This is what happens when a communications system becomes completely captured by capitalism. The only thing that gets communicated on the internet these days is ways to buy/sell products and services. I can't stand looking in my commercial email box (yes I have one set up for signing up to be advertised to, and one for personal communications). It has gotten to the point that I am trying to "clean" all personal communication off of the internet, and use it only for professional uses. This is not an easy task, and I am probably not the only one.

I haven't posted to my page in over a year. Logged in maybe 4 times in that same time. For me, it wasn't the "fear of missing out" on what's happening on Facebook. It was a "fear of missing out" on the real world that's happening right in front of me.

When I'm on my death-bed, I don't want to be saying "Gee, I wish I had 'like'd a few more cat pictures in my day."

Personally, I hope that is my only regret on my deathbed. I would much rather regret not liking cat photos as opposed to regretting something real.